No Box to Tick on the Ballot

April 21, Bangalore, India-- It's an election week in India, each state will elect its own official and delegate, but as usual many voices will go unheard. What they refer to as "ladyboys" in Thailand, and "trannies" in the US, culturally conservative India calls eunuchs, one of the many minority groups comprising India's diverse population. They're not the traditional eunuch, castrated and living a life in service to the emperor in the Forbidden City, for example, but modern day transsexuals who define their gender as neither entirely male or entirely female.

Eunuch numbers are estimated to be at around one million, and given India's population and its extraordinary number of marginalized minority groups, it's simply not high enough to catch the fancy of any candidate jostling for a minority vote--and so the likelihood that the demand for a third box on the ballot will not be fulfilled. In the meantime, another election will go by, one million voices will go unheard, simlpy because there's no line for them to stand in at the polls, and no appropriate gender box for them to tick on the ballot.

Especially in a state like Karnataka, which has become increasingly conservative in the past few years, with modern cities like Bangalore changing its curfew and liquor laws, the fear is that people like the eunuchs, who must resort to begging at intersections or jobs in the sex industry, are facing an uphill battle.

On the other hand, some voters reported that they were bribed with upwards of 10 kg of rice in exchange for a look at their voter registration cards. Muslims, and people in slums around Bangalore were targeted, primarily families with many children.

(Note: The day after elections, upwards of 40,000 voters in one slum district in Bangalore alone reported their names went missing from the voter lists, even if they had valid registration cards. Primarily women and Muslims seemed to have arrived at the polls, only to find their names had gone missing and they could not vote.)